“Mad Anthony” sat at breakfast alone. He looked up with sharp but not unkind scrutiny of his visitor as, cap in hand, the boy softly closed the door and stood awaiting his notice.
“Sit down there and tell me your story,” said the commander rather brusquely, indicating a three-legged stool near his table. Although he spoke in a quick, decisive way his voice was the kind which inspires confidence and the young visitor, though somewhat nervous, at no time was disconcerted by the business-like manner of the great soldier.
“Gladly, sir,” said Kingdom, seating himself, but for a moment hesitating just where to begin.
“Well, well, proceed then!” the general urged with a smile, and without further loss of time the boy told briefly who he was and what had brought him to the soldiers’ camp. He mentioned John Jerome’s connection with his story and John’s disappearance, alluding only briefly, for the time, to the murder at the salt springs, and to the charge of witchcraft that had been the beginning of the trouble. Of the lead mine he did not speak.
“I see no reason why we cannot give this Indian you are interested in his liberty,” said the general, when Ree had concluded. “But I am much afraid we can do nothing for your friend. Very likely he will turn up safe and sound before long. I am bound to say, though, that my advice to you would be that you do not go back to your cabin until these troublous times are over. How would you like to come with my men—be one of my scouts and interpreters? Come, now?”
Poor Ree, sadly disheartened, could only reply that if circumstances were different he would very much like to do so; but as it was, well, he simply couldn’t do anything until John Jerome was found. Then he told more fully of the trouble with Lone-Elk and how it had happened to result in the discovery of the two murdered men at the big “lick.”
Made more confident by Gen. Wayne’s interest, he told of the strange camp in the gully and his reason for believing that the salt springs murderer or murderers were there.
“You may be right,” said the commander, “and you may be wrong. That two men,—apparently men not fully accustomed to the woods,—should have been killed and their bodies concealed in the brush, is, in these times, not surprising. And the fact being that these men are to us unknown, while it does not make the murder less distressing or less a crime, does present a reason for our not being duty bound to unravel the mystery and attempt to punish the perpetrators of the deed. In short, if we begin to follow up singly each red-handed outrage committed along the border, we shall not have men for anything else. We can only bide our time and strike the savages collectively—strike a blow that will bring both them and their British supporters to their senses—a blow with something of suddenness about it.”
Kingdom’s hopes had dwindled to nothing. He wanted help, help to find John Jerome, help to carry out his plan to capture the salt springs criminals, and while he was about it, help to show Lone-Elk that he had powerful friends at his back who might make very costly to the Seneca any injury which was done the two young settlers on the land for which the Delawares had received a fair price.
Of course Gen. Wayne saw the whole trend of Kingdom’s thoughts. There is a power possessed, as a rule, by great generals in every walk of life, by which they see at a glance the workings of the minds of the less mature or less able men about them. Kingdom, however, was bright enough to understand all this perfectly, even while “Mad Anthony” talked with him. He felt that an injustice was done him. He knew that his motives were not by any means as selfish as they seemed. But how could he make himself better understood? He hesitated to try, and in his extremity, he played his last card—the lead mine.